Revanth Reddy Arrest: Sympathy waves for Congress

During Elections, if campaigning is one thing, making sure that it reaches public as intended, is another. Sometimes, it tends to fail and thus, activating the self-destruction mode. TRS has just done the same with Revanth Reddy’s arrest backfiring.

Earlier, Kodangal Congress leader Revanth Reddy warned KCR of dire consequences if the caretaker Chief Minister ever dared to tour his constituency. Revanth said that KCR has no right to tour Kodangal without implementing the key promises made by TRS during 2014 elections. K Chandrasekhar Rao was scheduled to tour Kosgi of Kodangal constituency and citing intelligence report, Revanth Reddy was detained Police in the early hours of Tuesday.

This has drawn severe criticism from the opposition parties. The Congress has even approached the High Court, which questioned the Police on the authenticity of the arrest. “We do not see a valid reason for the arrest of Revanth Reddy. If you have an intelligence report on possible violence why aren’t you carrying it?”, the High Cout bench questioned.

The Hyderabad HC has also directed the Attorney general to appear before it to record his statement. The Congress lodged a complaint with the EC alleging that the Chief Minister has used Police to refrain Revanth Reddy from campaigning for a whole day.

With even the High Court tagging the arrest as illegal, it has no doubt created a sympathy wave in favour of the Congress party. Sympathy waves just before elections are always dangerous and TRS seems to have pierced its own eye with a wrong move. However, the circumstances might have forced KCR to do this, as he cannot turn back fearing protests risking his party image just before elections. Protests against a high-profile leader would definitely send a negative feedback to the general public, which KCR planned to avoid through Revanth Reddy’s preventive arrest.